A whole chapter of assurances could not have lightened her husband's heart one half so effectually.
Even if the words he had uttered bore no immediate fruit, what did it matter? The ice was broken. Hereafter he could talk to her again and explain his meaning more fully. All the way to the station he had felt miserable. He had treated her always like a child, and now when he was forced to tell her she must do without any fresh toy to which she took a fancy, he imagined himself little better than a brute.
But Dolly had been told and was not vexed. Why, oh! why, had he not spoken to her before!
By the sad sea waves Mrs. Mortomley thought those last words over and over and over. She put two and two together. She estimated the amount the interest her own modest fortune brought back to the common fund, and then she reckoned as well as a woman who never professed to keep any accounts could reckon, the total of their annual expenditure.
The result was that when her husband did come down and ask her in his usual fashion, if she wanted money, (for indeed he was as much gratified as surprised at having heard no mention of that one thing needful in her short notes), she opened her purse and turned out its contents gleefully.
"Haven't I been good?" she asked; and then went on to ask,
"Archie, have you really and truly been troubled about these things?"
"A little," he answered.
"Then why did you not tell me sooner?"
"Why should I trouble you about such matters, love?"